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This forum is vastly popular among all Hackintosh users. There are many topics covered here and there.

Most of the important topics pinned section wise.But for a newbie its not easy to decide which guide they should follow.

Note : First search about your system in this forum, Other may have updated guide suitable for exact same system as you.If not follow this guide. I will try to try to point every important topics here in one. All original posts are linked, Go to original posts for detailed guide on that specific subject.

BIOS SETTING

While it is beneficial to have a unlocked BIOS (Mostly for Laptop Users) but it is not mandatory to install OS X. There are some basic things you should check in your BIOS before installing.

Disable VT-d (Virtualization). Or if you want to use virtualisation then use clover boot argument "dart=0"

Set SATA mode to "AHCI"

Set DVMT memory to 128 / 64 MB. If setting not present then you may need DVMT-prealloc patch in clover.(Checkout graphics section)

Disable secure boot.

Disable fastboot. (There are few laptops which works with first boot too.But you should turn off during installation )

you may use MBR or UEFI mode. But it is recommended to use UEFI due to it's many advantages over MBR. ( EX- faster device initialisation, Native support of Mac OS) MBR users need to apple MBR patch to their USB Installer media. [Catalina MBR Patch]

POINTs TO REMEMBER

1. SMBIOS

you need select SMBIOS of a similar Mac model as per your hardware. With unique and unused (Not Invalid) serial number.

Use CloverConfigurator and select a Mac model which has similar CPU and GPU as your system. (Exact same CPU ID not required)

If warranty details are available then change again.(You must not use serial numbers which are already registered)

Continue till you get a serial number which either says "Invalid". It means you have now a official serial number but No Mac has been produced with that serial number. Use that serial number.

Once you log in to Apple Account, You should not change your serial number.

2. KEXT Installation

There are three locations for Kext

\System\Library\Extensions : Exclusive for Apple System Kexts

\Library\Extensions : For third party Kexts

\Clover\Kexte\Other : Kext Injection during Boot

You can install any kext to either EFI\Clover\Kext\Other or else \Library\Extensions

During installation you can keep essential kexts in Clover\Kext\Other folder. But after Installation you should move kexts to L\E. As kext in L\E are loaded in to kernel Cache and monitored by kernel.It will make your system more stable and less boot time.

First thing to build a Hackintosh is emulation of a real Mac so that you can boot in to a OSX Installer.As your system can't directly boot a Mac OS, You need to boot either Clover , Chameleon or OpenCore. After booting in to these boot loader, you can boot in to OSX as well as your other OS like windows and linux.

After many years,these boot loaders not only help to boot but also handles a big part to make your system more compatible to OSX.

So choose wisely

2.1 Chameleon/Enoch

Chameleon was a oldest bootloader which was first developed to support MBR boot devices. Later they adopted to UEFI also. I still remember using it during the era of snow leopard, lion

it was mostly meant for advance user due to its feature to install directly to system BIOS.Where Clover and Chameleon can be used from hard disk or USB storage device.If you have knowledge of BIOS moving then you can go for it.It also can be used from hard disk too.

First download and install Any one of them to Installer USB. Configure it, Once you get it to work, then copy the same to your hard disk to make it permanent. Download Clover configurator to edit clover configuration. if you are new then download a nearest system spec prebuilt config file from rehabman's repo or else you may search in this forum too. then fine tune it.

Stability wise, would it be better to use FakeSMC for its long development period and a large amount of documentation around it.It is more stable and if you have old hardware then batter is to go with FakeSMC.

Sometimes latest release CPU does not get support unless Apple releases systems of same CPU generations. So you may not get support for all Mac OS version's support to all CPUs.In few cases you may use compatible CPU ids using clover's Fake CPU ID option.

5.Graphics :

While all intel integrated Graphics are supported natively, DualGPU are not supported. So first thing you need is to disable switchable graphics (AMD,nVidia) and use only Intel graphics only.

If you have discrete GPU which is not tied to Intel HD then you can use it. (Mostly desktop, few laptop which comes without IntelHD, discrete switching capability in BIOS)

Installation of WhateverGreen

So the first thing you need is WhateverGreen. It is a kext which works to fix most common graphics problems.(Ex- Sleep Issue, Brightness Control, Graphics Injection)

Nvidia & AMD mixup kext are also integrated to WhateverGreen. So it is recommended to install WhateverGreen irrespective of your graphics card.

Once you made proper adjustment to graphics, You need to look in to power management. While power management is mostly important for laptops,Desktop users also should look in to this so that their CPU can run optimal and smoothly.Power management is highly dependent on CPU and IGPU.

There are few different methods to get it working.The basic method is to use a SSDT.aml file generated "Pike R Alpha's Script".It is recommended and most stable.

Alternatively if your system is intel 4th gen or higher then you may use XCPM method. Also HWP mode if you have 6th gen or higher CPU.

1.1. Using auto generate states

This process is only applies to first generation intel processor or older. Only enable "GeneratePStates" & "Generate CStates" in config. No need to SSDT.aml

Sandybridge or higher CPU must not use this method.It will result kernel to Panic.

1.2 Using Custom SSDT

As I already mentioned,It is the most stable option and results optimised power consumption.

HWP was introduced during Skylake CPUs.The new tech is supposed to make the processor respond much quicker to performance burst requests as well as improving the effectiveness and efficiency of the performance bursts themselves. It does this by handing some extent of the frequency control back to the processor – which, in conjunction with the OS (which needs to allow it to take over control of P-States) can perform much better.

As you can now see your CPU performance using Intel Power Gadget or HWMoniter (Istat Menu for VirtualSMC Users) . While you are using SMBios of a nearest CPU, It may very a little bit in case of frquency,Turbo frequency and idling speed(LFM). (for example I am using MacBook Pro 14,1 SMBios,So my system is idling as 1.30GHZ which is a bit higher for me.Almost half speed of my CPU)

So you need to adjust your CPU frequency, Turbo Frequency and Idling speed(Keep it to minimum as 400MHz or 800MHz )as per your SMBIOS.

Choose your SMBios. It will Automatically Patch your LFM to minimum. You just change CPU max frequency and turbo frequency.

Once you are done your system will have a optimised CPU Power management .

2. USB port Management

From OS X 10.11, Apple changed the way USB ports work.(thanks to Rehabman for this info) As Mac OS uses ACPI to detect USB ports in a system, it often gets wrong value for a Hackintosh. So to solver the issue, you need a "USB port injector kext" to inject all your ports.

Also OSx has 15 port limit, you need to apply a port limit patch in clover.

Note: while this solves the issue, some times it may causes system instability . So you should disable mostly unused ports using DSDT hot patches (SSDT-UIAC.aml) ,Then remove port limit patch.

To do that download Hackintool and go to to USB tab. Now insert USB3.0 and USB 2.0 devices to every port, And rectify the details (Connector Type) accordingly. Once you finished checking all port, remove all the listed USBPorts which are not turned green(ports are not usable). Then Export SSDT-UIAC.aml ,install to clover/ACPI/Patched .

USB Power Management:

Most of the laptop has EC device named mostly as EC0 or H_EC . Rename the device to EC by Clover DSDT patch to load ApplePowerBusController under EC. (You can confirm in IoReg)

If you don't have a EC device then add a Fake EC Device.

Newer Mac device use device named USBX.So People who are using SMBIOS higher then iMac 7,1 or MacBook 13,1 should add an device named USBX under scope _SB . If you used Hackintool to eliminate unused USB ports then you must have gotten SSDT-USBX.aml if needed for your system.

Audio is almost common issue due large range of audio Codecs and controllers . There are three major options for Audio fix. All have different way to enable sound so installation guides are also different. Must 'rename HDAS to HDEF' By DSDT edit or Clover.

3.1 VoodooHDA

It is the oldest kext built to fix audio devices. This works as a alternative option to Apple's native AppleHDA.

While VoodooHDA supports large number of devices, It provides a lower sound quality for few cases.

If you are using VirtualSMC then you have already got a SMCBattery plugin.

It uses a different to approach. So you don't need any DSDT patch.It works out of the box in most of the cases.

If not then check you IOReg first.AppleACPIACAdapter kext should be loaded under device ADP1. If no ADP1 device is present,Then rename your AC Adapter device (Something like AC, ACAD) to ADP1 . [Original Post]

Download link is present in SMC Section.

5.Connectivity

Connectivity is a major part Hackintosh. Properly installation of ethernet is required to iMessage activation. Also bluetooth and Wifi need to be configured properly to continuity and Handoff feature to work.

Atheros wifi cards are supported up to 10.12 . While it can be used further using older kext but you may get random system crashes.

You can use various method like custom injector Kext or using DSDT patches. It is recommended to change with supported Broadcom card.

Broadcom Wifi

Supported Cards :

As apple uses Broadcom WLAN cards for their Mac.Cards like 94360 are natively supported , Others few (Like popular 94352Z) are compatible with OS X with Wifi AC (5.0 ghz) support. In few cases you may need to edit country code for Wifi AC to work.

OPENSTEP was an operating system created by NeXT Software Inc. It served as the basis for Mac OS X after Steve Jobs came back to Apple after Apple acquired NeXT. This is simply to show computer history.